Amidst the hype and expectation that the service could have thanks to its backing, it appears as though the popularity of Twitter’s relatively new ‘social music app’ has far from matched expectations, with rumours now circulating that the service is prepared to shut down due to lack of interest.

Sources reported to AllThingsD that Twitter’s iOS app ‘Twitter #music’ could be taken offline in the near future after what has been seen as an ‘abysmal’ level of downloads and ranking performance.

‘Twitter #music’ is noted as having peaked at #6 in the Apple App Store upon its release in April, but poor performance has seen it slip further and further away to the point where it is beneath the #1,000 barrier (measured most recently for the end of August in position #1,672, and #264 of all current music platforms on iTunes).

Believed to be a move that contributes to a ‘clean-up’ of Twitter’s image ahead of an ‘initial public offering’ listing on the New York Stock Exchange, the decision to remove #music would be one which sees developments in ‘content discovery and playback through trends on the social media website’ (per user and in general) rendered null and void, with only a few months of hits reaching far below expectations all they have to show for it.

Despite the efforts, with little publicity and being seen as a poor alternative to existing competitors, the Twitter branding attached to #music has not been enough to prevent the platform being seen as ‘dead wood’ even internally. AllThingsD wrote of the potential developments: “As Twitter mulls how to end its #Music effort, the company is likely to further chase its cross-platform strategy of partnering with other companies and brands on music-related deals. Twitter partnered with Apple earlier this year, producing a trending playlist station for iTunes Radio, Apple’s Pandora-like music initiative for its online music sales portal. Twitter also added its playlists to Rdio, another online music service.”

As an example of how not to run a successful music streaming service, does Twitter’s impending #shutdown showcase the extreme difficulty that all #newcomers will have to face in making any sort of a challenge on the industry? Hashtag end of story…

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The BBC’s up-and-coming ‘BBC iPlayer Radio’ service recently managed to draw in respectable portion of all visitors to the iPlayer brand, and continuing their commitment to providing all of the service’s best of the ‘A’ in ‘A/V’ with the addition of podcasts to their online selection as another download option.

Unlike radio programming, BBC radio podcasts are not tied to a content ‘timer’ on downloads on account of removing all unlicensed music from a podcast program, giving them a longer life (turning to ‘indefinite’ once downloaded) and a more accessible range of content in terms of being ‘broken down’ into specific uninterrupted shows rather than one extended broadcast (which can often include news breaks).

BBC executive producer James Simcock said of the upcoming update to the iPlayer Radio service: “With over 3 million downloads and counting, the BBC iPlayer Radio app (now available on iOS, Android and Amazon devices) is evolving. Since we first launched the app, we’ve been listening closely to audience feedback with a view to make continuous improvements to the apps. I’m proud to say that we’ve now implemented the single most requested new feature – podcast downloads.”

Alongside the ‘podcast’ feature, upgrades to the BBC iPlayer Radio app include the ability to choose methods of download (either mobile networks or WiFi), and a new section entitled ‘My Downloads’ for management of a user’s podcast saves.

The improvements will naturally enhance the offering that the BBC can provide to its mobile subscribers and potentially boost their user numbers as a whole and in particular for their listening services, as a report from the broadcasters over the current state of the service noted of present trends across online TV and radio: “The profile of BBC iPlayer users [which totaled 234m hits in August 2013] has evened out over time in terms of male/female ratio, but remains strongly under-55 in terms of age, which is younger than the typical TV viewer or radio listener’s profile (although more in line with home broadband users). BBC iPlayer is used for TV at roughly the same time of day as linear TV viewing, although there is proportionally more daytime and late-peak use. For radio, BBC iPlayer is used far more.”

The move will be aimed at new but primarily long-term loyal customers, with the announcement that anyone in the UK who has purchased a CD, vinyl record of cassette album from their site since 1999 are eligible to have all of those purchases added to their digital collection of MP3 files free of charge, offering the new copies of the songs for download or streaming.

A recent survey of the UK’s music industry by the BPI found that for 2012, the balance of physical/digital album sales was 70/30, while single songs were sold at the vastly different rate of 3/97.

AutoRip made its debut in Amazon’s home country of the USA in January, while rolling out to France, Germany and Italy earlier this week, with over 350,000 albums said to be available on the service due to deals with all major record labels and a large number of independents.

The service will also require no input from the user regarding the files’ availability, with customers logging into the Amazon Cloud Player now able to find any music purchase from their Amazon account from 1999 onwards in their locker immediately provided it is licenced, available for direct download in the 256kb/s MP3 format, or stored as one of the 250 songs (250,000 for premium subscribers to the service) in server limit on Cloud Player able to be streamed through computers, tablet computers, and smartphones.

Amazon’s ‘vice-president of digital music’, the aptly-named Steve Boom, said of the intentions of the AutoRip service: “In the US, customer feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, both in terms of direct feedback to us and social media posts. It’s a simple, easy-to-understand proposition, and it’s also been a great introduction for our customers to the digital services that we have to offer. AutoRip is a gentle bridge between the two worlds, that’s the way we think about it. People can experience digital music while still in the comfort of their existing purchasing behaviour. They can get the best of both worlds. A lot of people still like having that physical product. They like to collect, or they like the album art and liner notes that aren’t as good in digital.”

He continued by noting how the service has for a long time been a part of their plans: “We wish we could have done this many years ago, but we weren’t able to: we couldn’t have gotten the rights [from labels] several years ago, so things have changed. One reason is that AutoRip is adding value back to owning an album. The digital business is very track-focused, and not as much album-focused. Artists like this because it encourages people to buy the whole album. There is no indication that access will replace ownership any time soon. Access will become more and more important, ownership will continue to be important, and some people will do both. People listen and enjoy music in a myriad of ways.”

Planning to offer a free innovation that offers the best of both worlds by introducing streaming with no pressure on old-school music buyers, will Amazon’s opportunity to let users own their music twice over (without having to perform a ‘manual’ digital conversion) manage to attract new users to cloud streaming?

While requests for live coverage of the funeral of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was a large draw for the streaming platform in the month, it was not enough to prevent the lowest overall view count since December 2012, leading off from the joint-record 272m recorded in March. The BBC, however, claim that the iPlayer is performing well in spite of the circumstances, as Easter holidays and more daylight were recognized as likely and predictable reasons for such a decline.

The Margaret Thatcher funeral, however, bucked the trend for April when it became the ‘second most-requested live TV broadcast’ in the iPlayer’s history with 832,000 live viewers (of a total ‘+catch-up’ audience of 986,000), beaten only by events at the 2012 Olympic Games.

Breaking down the overall figures, it was recognized that average ‘daily requests’ on iPlayer hit 7.9m, while 57m per week were recorded in April’s second and third weeks. Mobile and tablet users, meanwhile, were collectively responsible for 75 million views, representing 30% of the total figures.

The presence of the BBC’s iPlayer Radio platform also had a strong month, rising to a service record of 74 million requests in one month (an increase of 3% on the 72 million of March), although 84% of those were ‘live’ listeners. In a further development for the spin-off service, the broadcaster has announced that users will soon be able to download radio shows available on iPlayer, with similar ’30 day’ content restrictions as applied to the free videos offered by iPlayer.

With listeners currently only able to stream radio for up to 7 days post-broadcast (excluding BBC podcasts), the BBC Trust have confirmed plans to launch radio downloads in 2014.

A BBC spokesman summarised of the move, expected to cost £150,000 due to implementing a new digital rights management (DRM) system: “We are delighted with the Trust’s decision. We will now start work to bring download functionality to BBC iPlayer Radio, a process which we anticipate will take some months yet.”

With up to 7,600 hours of radio content each week due to become available for download, is iPlayer’s first spin-off set to become even more evenly-matched in numbers with its big brother following these developments?

Radio streaming on the BBC iPlayer continues to grow, with a record-breaking 74 million requests in April, up 3% on March’s 72 million requests.

First announced at the search engine company’s ‘I/O keynote’ in San Francisco (USA), the new service, called ‘Google Play Music All-Access’ has initially opened this week to a North American market, at a price of $9.99 per month for consumers.

The launch will see the service offered in a ’30-day free trial’ format, with a special ‘price reduction’ offer to users that take a chance on the service prior to the end of June, with a monthly fee of $7.99 offered to the early takers, a $2-per-month saving which could be a huge draw for music streaming fans.

The service is described as being “…a uniquely Google approach to a music subscription service”, in which the users are able to find content through search categories, along with customising playlists and listening to live radio.

Planning to launch the service for other markets in the near future, will Google’s Play Music All-Access, which has the confirmed content licensing support from Universal Music and Sony Music (with rumours that Warner Music Group are also part of the platform), manage to put up a strong challenge against the likes of Spotify?

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For those using Dish Network’s new Ad-skipping AutoHop feature, you will be able to continue using it. At least for the time being. A U.S District Court Judge in California has denied broadcast network FOX’s request for a preliminary injunction against the AutoHop, which allows Dish Network subscribers the ability to skip past advertisements all together.

Keep skipping those ads…For now.

FOX requested the injunction back in August and is part of a copyright-infringement lawsuit between the two companies. All of the other major broadcast networks ABC, NBC, and CBS also have their own lawsuits against Dish for the AutoHop feature. FOX plans on appealing the court’s decision to deny the injunction.

“We are disappointed the court erred in finding that Fox’s damages were not suitable for a preliminary injunction,” FOX said in a statement. “We intend to appeal that portion of the court’s decision, as well as the court’s separate findings concerning the PrimeTime Anytime service.” An attorney for Dish Network was thrilled with the denial and said, “Today’s ruling is a victory for common sense and customer choice.”

Dish Network began offering the Hopper Whole-Home DVR service earlier this year and it allows subscribers to simply skip past commercials with one button press on pre-recorded television shows. Additionally it boasts features like viewing recorded content in different rooms and picking up where you left off on a different receiver.

The service initially drew the ire of both broadcast and cable networks, who rely on selling advertising to produce the various shows on their networks. Dish has continued to argue that the technology is simply a more advanced DVR and has even used the idea of the fast-forward button on old VCR’s to further lament their point.